The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1887-06-01
THE NATURAL-GAs BELT.
Ex-Governor Anderson's Theories to tn
Proper Place to Bore for Gas.

Ex-Governor Anderson, of Ohio has written
characteristic aud remarkable letter about nat
ural gas. The following is a passages:
"Ohios corps of geological engineers had
hardly settled themselves, and almost every one
else, into the conviction that these products
must be found in the 'Berea sandstone aud in
its adjacent porous Strata and could not be
found in the Trenton any other limestone
of lower formations, when. To- the foolhardy
boring of old doctor at Findlay, in Hancock
county, Ohio, far away, too from any coal-feld.
brought up to the grass aud to the air. in swift
upstream and with roaring noises, one of the
best aud biggest 'gushers' of this age of gushes.
and exactly, too, from that very low down 'Tren-
ton limestone That Ohio corps was one of the
ablest ever organized in our Nation. That dem
onstration OF the impossible, it must be ad
mitted, looks quite satisfactory If not IMAM
swerable But the earth itself actually does
answer right against the demonstration. Geol
ogy as science. then, and even in the hands OF
its best experts, is very blind guide for practi-
cal ends, even at this late date. But we to
these recent Ohio and Indiana discoveries debt
for much added and trustworthy knowledge"
The Governor gives eloquent account of
the New Madrid earthquake, which made Reel
foot lake. He says:
1.-The central ttha. is. the most violently point
OF that earth breaking eommotion must have
been at Reelfoot lake. and not at New Madrid
precisely And no earthquake of the globe has
ever left behind 1t such signal proof of it's vast
power, as it now stands fixed in this lake, which
was then made. perhaps, within five minutes.
1t extends from the northern part of Dyer coun-
ty, through Obion county, Tennessee. into Full
ton county, Kentucky, about forty miles in
length and five to ten miles in width. It is OF
unknown depth, but is probably two hundred or
more feet In depth, for the tallest trees of re-
gion famous for it's tall and large trees stand
with their tops fifty sixty feet below the
face OF the water. Neither at Lisbon. where the
shock simultaneously pervaded 700 900 square
miles, or the twelfth part of the whole globe,
and where 30. 600 inhabitants were destroyed at
once-A. d. 1855: nor at Robamba Quito in
1897. where 40, 900 perished nor in Sicily. where
co., 600; nor yet in Asia Minor and Syria, where
100000 persisted, can you find any present traces
OF these dread disasters. Time, the universal
healer, has repaired and restored all their
olden features of landscapes. But here still
stands our Reelfoot lake, with it's neighboring
sunken land. in perpetual nnemen to of that most
awful breaking and shaking of the crust of the
earth"
Again:
THAT this violent movement extended upon
various radial lines las up the Arkansas river.
etc. J. is certain. And of these lines of disturb
ance it is also most certain that the largest and
most violent that one which passed to
the northeast For chance to remember more
than half century ago to have heard it said, in
that very region, too, that Voney. the celebrated
French traveller and philosopher, had declared
that the chief line of this New Madrid earth
quake must have passed through the northern
part of Darke county. Ohio. When or where
Volney wrote this scientific surmise I cannot
guess. But also rememb Der. nearly as long ago,
to have read in DIR. Brakes Picture of Clncin-
natl like statement. viz: that this earthquake
was most distinguished for its violence along the
same line. through the northwest corner of Ohio
Col. Robert Patterson. at Ruhicon near Dayton.
and of James Nesbet, near West Alexandria, in
Preble county, Ohio, were cracked by it from
top to bottom.
Humboldt fixes this line between New Mad
rid and Little Prairie, north of Cincinnati, in
the United States OF America, in December.
ISL ISL, as well as through the whole winter of
1S12-'-Cosmos D. I'll Hot steam
was elected at New Madrid, in the valley of the
Mississippi, in 1812.'-Idem 2l3. The
advance from south to north very striking
in a of IA
soil in the alluvial valleys of the Mississippi. the
Arkansas and the Ohio, from 1911 to 1873
Again, so important in Humboldts view was this
great phenomenon that he reverts to it in Cos
mos V, a. III, in these words, viz: The great
phenomena of 1876 and 1897, and of 1911 and
1872, occurred in the following order:
December, 1871 innumerable shocks in the
river valleys of the Ohio, Mississippi and Ar
kansas. up to 1913. Between New Madrid and
Little Prairie and La Saline to the north of
Cincinnati the earthquakes occurred almost
every hour for months together
with much knowledge of that section, and
when it was in a wild state too. in my school
boy residence, I unable to fix that Little
Prairie La Saline l incline. however, to
think that 'Shanes PRAIRIE in Mercer county.
Ohio was meant for the former.
"Some two years back all the geological high
priests were astonished at the grand outgushing
by that first Findlay gas we'll. Very soon other
gas and oil wells We're successfully bored to the
northwestward of Findlay towards Tiffin, ETC.,
and then south westwardly in Indiana, and III or
near that direct line they still being found,
or made rather, day by day and almost every
day! What now is that line2 Withdrawals
does it point in its southwestward direction? Let
Canada look after her own GASES across her lake
gorge Our business is with the els Findlay
side of this line and question. And putting your
straightest rule on your best maps and you will
find that the same course of this Ohio line OF
gas wells on the northeast of Fndlay. when ex-
tended southwardly, will prolong itself through
Randolph and Warrick counties and just east
of Evansville in Indiana. and through Hender-
county, Kentucky. and will pass on near the
center under Redfoot lake. If. then, it
be this grand, silent swift and almost
omnipotent earth-shaking force which so
breaks and sinks its very rock statue
into that natural hell of molten fires composing
the core of our globe; and if it be true land
what else can we now believef that these fs-
sures or faults, caverns have. by sipage, or
drainage, become the reservoirs of all these vast
oil products, through past centuries, or 3ons Of
pasr centuries; and if it be true that the earths
crust must give way THAT is, must make reser-
that these undulatory movements of the soil,
during almost two years (1811-1613) do prove
that this line through New Madrid and Findlay,
O., is this weakest line. and must, therefore,
consist of assures and faults for reservoirs how,
then, can possibly escape the conclusion that
of all this earth there s not nor there cannot
be- any one line more likely to justify this bor
ing for natural gas and oil than just exactly that
line which runs back from the critical fault at
Pindiay o. 70 that eentoF g; OF r1mmo.on at
it is most reasonable to explore for these
faults and reservoirs along the line of
them Some corrections. however, are here
necessary at this point. a. do not claim, nor
do / believe with very ingenious friend of
mine Ito whom l am indebted for stimulation
in this tneorizng). that the New Madrid earth
quake made those assures in these rock
sponges which now hold the oil and natural
gas. The earthquakes of 1011-lSl3 only fol-
lowed in the road which antecedent earthquakes
had long before opened up for them. Some of
these preceding earthquakes, the first one. prob
ably, had thus fractured the Trentron lime
stone. ~ This line cannot be either very
straight nor simple nor a narrow line. For,
on the contrary, the principal of tho universal
law that things must break bend along the
line of least resistance. necessarily enforces
belief that the actual line can be neither per-
fectly straight without many and wide
branchines on the side and the other. And
this conclusion is inevitable from the mathe-
mates of radi viz: That these variations
from the true line must diminish in distances
apart and that these assures must increase in